I took some notes from http://webexny2008.crowdvine.com/talks/show/1020 - Apologies for spelling errors and typos...

Momentum - with out it you are going to trend toward mediocrity

Typically, people eventually lose interest and just want to finish it

Ideal situation is the bursting sound wave

We try to break all of our big projects into as many small projects as possible. Don't like to work on projects longer than 2 weeks.

NO Roadmaps Specifications or Projections "The problem with roadmaps is you're setting your future in stone."

Specification docs are basically a collection of Yeses, and there's little penalty for adding to it.

Get rid of abstractions - "What are we working on right now? That's the most important"

Decisions are temporary. "You should be optimizing for now."

Red Flag Words - We do a lot of collaboration by typing. The more we collaborate the more we use certain words.

Need - Instead, how "Might we try this?"
Can't - "The truth is you probably can."
Easy - A word you use to describe other people's jobs
Everyone & Nobody - "People use these words to justify decisions. You're really exaggerating and blurring the point."

Interruption is the Enemy of Productivity - "The closer you are with somebody, the less work you actually get done."

Taps on the shoulder
Required meegings
Calling someone's name
"Hey check this out"
Phones & Blackberries

That's why most people get work done in the morning and late at night

A fragmented day is not a productive day. "The only way we ever see each other is on a Thursday. We try to stay away from each other as much as possible. Maybe you can institute a policy where one day a week, noone talks to each other."

Use tools where people can put things to the side and come back to it later.

Focus on what doesn't change - "The tech and software biz seems to be obsessed with change. There's always new stuff coming around the corner.

Today and 10 years from now. "People aren't going to wake up one day and wish things are slower. Speed is always worthwhile. You're better off paying attention to things that aren't going to change in your business."

Avoid worrying about things that don't matter yet - "This is why a lot of projects are late."

"I found it's better to sketch with a big fat sharpie. With a sharpie, you can't create detail. Which is good, because you don't want to focus on detail early on. You want to spend minutes, not days, on a sketch."

**The longer it takes to develop something, the less likely you'll launch it**

Underdoing - "There's a cold war going on out there where everyone's trying to out-do each other. It's like the arms race. It's very expensive and very difficult to win the cold war. It's not something a small business can really do."

Target nonconsumption - (Quoting Clayton Christonson ?Ssp?) "There is this group of people who are not consumers who want to be consumers."

Pick things that are more downmarket, and solving the very very simple problems. the big guys won't even notice you because they've already moved away from that market.

Find the right size - "There's only two things whose sole purpose is to grow for ever: Business and Tumors. You don't have to set the goal of being Google or Facebook

Grow slow - if you go from 10 people to 100 in a year, you might miss a step.

Ricardo Semler (sp?) has a book called Maverick - Oxford University is one of the best university in the world, so why aren't there hundreds of them? Because they found the right size for them.

Follow the chefs - Lagasse, Batali, Flay, Child etc. - They out-teach out share out contribute. "I'm going to give you all of my secrets. They're not afraid to share all of their knowledge. ... So what's your cookbook? We wrote a book called "getting real?" It's not the idea, it's the execution at the end of the day.

"A company is lcuky if it has customers, more if it has fans and even more if it has an audience."

Always be asking questions
Why are we doing this?
What problem are we solving?
Is this actually useful or is it just cool?
Are we adding value? - Addding something doesn't necessaryly add value. Everything you add, dilutes the product.
Will this change behavior? If not, you want to think about leaving it off
Is there an easier way? The easy is probably more than good enough.

**DOn't think out loud about this

Give up on hard problems. There are abundance of easy problems. I think focusing on the hard problems are better left to your competitors and often not worth it. If you solve 10 easy problems in a month, it's better than working on one hard problems in a month.

32 vs 40 - If you work less, they actually work better. We find that the work is just as good, and people are usually happier. The benefits we see with happier people is work that is better. People just cut out the shit that doesn't matter.

To start affecting the change you want in your company, find a small project that you can showcase, and get them to see how well it works.

Question: How do you be a great client? You need to figure out why you hired them and give them some leeway and more trust. You try to do the project yourself. There's kind of a big disconnect. We need to respect designers like we would if they were an electrican or a plummer.